2 ms·

This reminds me of one of my favorite short stories: Valuable Humans in Transit by qntm. https://qntm.org/transi https://qntm.org/transi

• Terr_ 3y ago
  > I didn't detect it coming. I first noticed it on a webcam feed, of all places. It must have come out of an observational blind spot. Solar glare alone cuts out a quarter of the sky, to say nothing of our enormous coverage shortfalls, but now's not the time for retrospectives. After reading the story it makes me think of a quote from a Bujold book, where one fantasy character talks about how it was a godly miracle that 300 heathen invaders were completely eradicated after their grave sin of murdering one local saint, and another character retorts. Adjusting that response to fit: "I would be considerably more impressed with your global nanotech overlord AI," said Ista through her teeth, "if He could have arranged a few satellites worth of simple detection in advance, rather than several billion lives' worth of gaudy evacuation afterward."